By Edward Wong

Hikers in Yunnan Province on the path to the Mystic Waterfall.

I had high expectations for the holy lake. The locals called it Mystic Lake. Who could not be inspired by a place with a name like that, in the Tibetan hinterlands of southwest China? A sip of the water, and I would either attain enlightenment or get giardiasis.

Then there was the fact that I and several companions had just spent five hours that morning striding and sweating and clambering up the sheer side of a mountain. We had a guide with us, a construction worker named Tsering. We had also been joined by Ngawang, a young monk in red robes from a nearby monastery who was making his first pilgrimage to the lake.

The path had been hard to follow, weaving back and forth beneath a canopy of pine trees. The view opened up only after we emerged from the rhododendron groves covering the steepest part of the trail. We were greeted by a sweeping panorama of the snow peaks, including the 22,117-foot summit of Kawa Karpo, one of the holiest mountains among Tibetans.

After lunch in a high pasture, we forced our aching legs over a ridge and to the lake.

It was not what I had expected. Dull water lapped at the edges of the lake. Small hills, even duller in color, ringed the lake, which did not look much larger than one of the ponds in Central Park. There were no glaciers tumbling down from the mountains, no ice floes in the water. A small set of Tibetan prayer flags fluttered next to a pile of stones.

"So this is it?" said Shu Yang, a backpacker from Henan Province whom I had met at my guesthouse.

Then Ngawang dropped to the ground and prostrated himself before the lake. He pulled a book from a satchel and began reciting mantras. So high up were we, at nearly 15,000 feet, that the soft chanting seemed to float like incense into the clear blue sky.

I sat down and closed my eyes and listened. I began noticing things: The warmth of the afternoon sun on my face. The silence after Ngawang stopped chanting.

The minutes wore on. The silence deepened. Even the cries of birds seemed to be swallowed up by the void.